Wednesday, 14 July 2010

After Friesland, now the province of Brabant is testing the quality of their cycle route network. They are using an instrumented car to drive along the regional cycle paths of the 21 councils in the Eindhoven region.

The survey will record the types of cycle facility (separate cycle path, bicycle street, parallel facility, cycle lane or other), and also such things as the type quality of the surface and the width.

Factors such as how obvious it is where cyclists belong, whether crossings give cyclists priority, priority at traffic lights and the speed of other traffic at crossings will also be recorded.

Also the region will gain an insight into the social safety for cyclists and the quality of directional signage.

GPS is being used to position photos of all cycling facilities on a map.

It would be worth doing this in the UK to record how pathetic our infrastructure is, but most of our cycle paths have railings and other street furniture which is a PITA to ride past, let alone drive a car around.

Sirius7dk: It's the first thought that occurred to me. There are also instrumented bikes used for surveys.

It's a long project, taking a lot of time. Maybe one consideration is that the work can be done even in the middle of winter, spending all day driving extremely slowly, but with civilized conditions for the driver vs. being out in the weather.

Christhebull: The railings, motorbike gates and other obstructions on British paths really have to go. Apart from making surveys like this difficult, they also make it difficult to maintain the paths.

I suppose there are at last 2 people in the car, the driver and the one taking notes and operating the various equipment. Apart from that, electronic stuff doesn't like rain, dust and sunshine. So yes, it's only logical to use a car, a reasonably narrow one (Fiat Sedici as far as I can see) to fit the cycle path.

My taxpayer's gut says they're overdoing things, but they will no doubt have their reasons.

I have to say it would have been better for the authorities to show a velomobile kitted out with a camera and a GPS. One of the critisms against the highway teams in the UK is that they don't appear to see anything except through a car windscreen. Does the money spent on this project come from the cycling budget? Can't help but laugh if even a small part is being spent on a car! Cheers, Mark, Bristol UK.

Study Tours

You've read the blog, now see everything with your own eyes. Since 2006, hundreds of people have joined us on our Cycling Study Tours.
First hand experience is better than reading. Book a tour to see how policy and infrastructure have attracted people from all walks of life to cycle:

Support this blog

Thousands of hours of work have gone into compiling the information on this blog but we do not receive grants and we do not ask for charity to support us.

You can help to make further blog posts possible by buying proven bicycle components from us:

Copyright and Licensing

This blog is free of charge to read and for most individual usage including reasonable "quoting" of its contents. However, neither the text nor the photos on this blog are in the public domain. To find out more, please read our copyright and licensing information.

Search This Blog

Loading...

Non-sponsored links

Experience for yourself how policy and infrastructure in Assen and Groningen have led to the high cycling modal share in this area:

If you like this blog please support us so we can continue. We sell quality bicycle components:

Cycling holidays in Assen and Drenthe, where this blog is based:
All the youtube videos from this blog:

About us

A cyclist in a cycling family living in the capital of the cycling province of the world's greatest cycling country.
I was born in the UK, lived for over 8 years in New Zealand and have lived in the Netherlands since 2007.
I organise cycling infrastructure study tours, run an online bicycle shop, arrange cycling holidays and write a popular blog about cycling.
My email address is avftcp@hembrow.eu